Na Magha manager Doherty wants Championship points not plaudits

Doherty and his players were frustrated by a more experienced Lavey team on the day the Derry senior hurling championship finally returned to Derry City. That feat alone shines a light on the sterling off the field work being done by the Ballyarnett club, work that has benefitted the club’s underage teams over the past few years and should soon provide the seniors with an array of new talent.

A first appearance by a Na Magha reserve team was another indicator that the club is moving forward at pace but while Doherty has nothing but praise for the work being done, he says the senior team are no longer interested in just making up the championship numbers.

“We came here today with confidence, thinking ‘Let’s give Lavey a rattle’ and let’s get a result,” explained the Na Magha manager after Sunday’s 0-10 to 0-15 Group A defeat.

“We were looking to win this game. By no stretch of the imagination were we coming here thinking ‘we’re city men, let’s put our shoulder to the wheel to keep hurling going in the town’, that’s not our attitude. We had prepared well over the last couple of weeks and we came here to get a result.

“The lads played very well, fought very hard and were beat by five points but by no means were we coming here defeated before the game started, we came here looking for a result.

“You could absolutely see progress. In years gone by there would have been a fear of losing by a big margin whereas our players are now thinking, ‘Let’s put it up to them, let’s get the scores on the board and let’s win a game’. It didn’t work out for us but that’s hurling. We will regroup and go again against Ballinascreen. That’s going to be another step up so we will see how we get on.”

A lack of potency against a strong Lavey defence ultimately cost Na Magha but it was a performance full of encouragement, especially in defence where Doherty’s team were superb.

“We will get loads from that match today. The fact we were beat by five points is disappointing and not what we wanted but at the same time, that might have been 16 points the year before. Yes we were beat and we did come expecting to win but there were positives all over the field for us.

“At the back, Diarmuid Shiels was superb in the middle and Robbie Hegarty, who was actually struggling with a shoulder injury over the last two or three days, played very, very well. In the other corner was Mark McShane and he’s another lads coming through, he was really aggressive and did his job very well as well.

“Fearghal McAnaney stepped in (to centre half back) and took over Scoot’s (Alan Grant’s) role and I thought he played really well. We had a couple of challenge matches before today and he stood up in those as well. He was very aggressive and very good on the ball.”